Every look back at the 2017 holiday selling season shows massive growth for mobile purchasing.
Search marketing firm NetElixir said that mobile visits were up across most retail categories, with apparel seeing the largest growth at 32 percent.
Adobe’s final report showed that mobile accounted for 33.1 percent of the total $108.2 billion generated, bringing in $35.9 billion.
Yet there’s a belief that something was left on the table.
Specifically, as we learned in a The Art of Mobile Persuasion podcast episode earlier this month (episode 23 here - https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/art-mobile-persuasion-podcast/id1156481550?mt=2), retail expert Ryan Craver pointed to challenges that many consumers faced in purchasing products directly on some web sites and mobile apps.
Enabling commerce is one of the 2018 priorities for many marketers.
But the job doesn’t end there.
In part two of the podcast interview posted this week (episode 26 here - https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/art-mobile-persuasion-podcast/id1156481550?mt=2), Craver strongly recommends supplementing owned channel efforts with plans to go where there is significant retail traffic.
“Pay attention to where the market’s eyeballs are,” he told me. “Obviously, on the brick and mortar side, we have the big box guys like the Costcos and the Walmarts. But what these guys are building online is the same type of marketplace that is driving market share.
“Every organization, whether they are a brand or a retailer, needs to figure out where they are going to play outside their own channels. Living off of your own stores, living off of your own dot com, is no longer a winning strategy.”
Craver, formerly a Senior Vice President of Strategy at Hudson’s Bay Company and a key voice in my The Art of Mobile Persuasion book (artofmobilepersuasion.com), said that ignoring the major commerce players is a recipe for disaster.
“When you have guys out there like Amazon who have 50 percent of the market growth in e-commerce, you need to figure out if you are going to be on them,” he said. “If you are not, should you be on Zappos, or Shopbop or some of the other brands that they own?
“Maybe you say, ‘I hate Seattle, I hate Amazon.’ Then, I say, ‘OK, figure out if you are going to be on Walmart or Jet if Amazon isn’t your cup of tea.’ If those don’t work, will you be on Google Express or Instacart?
“All of these websites, beyond Google, specific retailers like kohls.com, macys.com, homedepot.com, target.com, all allow you to buy ads on their websites. If you are thinking as a marketer to get closest to the point of purchase, you need to look at these websites. If you are not, you are probably doing yourself a disservice. The closest you can be to the customer buying something is right on the rails of the retailer.”
Craver details more specific actions to take in Episode 26. It’s a bunch of smart thinking early in the year, giving us all time to develop a strategy and to execute on it for this year’s holiday season.
